On an outing with his kids, McNulty manages to get Stringer's license plate number. Omar goes after Stinkum, who killed his boyfriend Brandon. Using information they've gotten off the wire, the squad busts someone who collects $20,000 in cash. The man turns out to a driver for someone with enough influence to get the money returned to him. The Deputy Chief hits the roof and Lt. Daniels fears for his career. He also orders the investigation shut down but Judge Phelan steps in.

In this episode we finally see clearly exactly why Burrell was so insistent about pursuing the case via buy-busts rather than trying anything more elaborate, regardless of how difficult a target Avon Barksdale has proven to be, and regardless of how much damage his gang might be doing. Maybe Burrell didn't know exactly what minion of what politician would be the one to get scooped up by the investigation, but he had an idea that something like this could happen. (Although it may be worth noting that Day-Day is Clay Davis's driver, the state senator that Burrell pointed out to Daniels as a pop quiz at the party in the previous episode.)

One of the sad (or infuriating) unspoken ironies of the show is that the first representative of Burrell's to show up and take a look at Day-Day is the IID Major -- the guy whose job it is to investigate crooked cops. And yet Burrell orders Daniels to write the stop up as unwarranted (when the detail had very solid PC), orders the police to give the money back, and even tries to shut down the investigation. I'm not a lawyer but that seems rather brazenly corrupt to me.

Speaking of corruption, McNulty finally called Daniels out (albeit in a veiled way) about the info Agent Fitzhugh gave him about Daniels possibly being dirty. "Why, does [the Deputy] have something on you?" And McNulty did raise a pretty good point about Daniels/Burrell's inconsistent attitudes towards chain of command.

Also in this episode, Lester and Kima started doing the preliminary work to try to get a dancer at Orlando's as an informant. Kima's instincts about who to target are even better than either Lester or Kima could possibly realize, given her current relationship with D'Angelo.

Speaking of D'Angelo, he showed a little bit more naivete this episode when he mentioned Orlando's offer of a coke connect to some of his uncle's most loyal guys. He said it like he didn't think anybody would have a problem with it, but Orlando's conspiratorial manner should've at least set off some alarm bells, right? It seemed pretty clear that he was going behind Avon's back, though I guess D' could've just passed that off as Orlando being a bit nervous/cautious about his first real drug deal.

Last edited by Artukka on Fri Aug 18, 2017 5:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

That whole scene with Omar was great. What an awkward position. They know for a fact he is lying to them, Omar knows they know, but there is nothing anyone can do about it right now because Omar has put himself in a position where the police need him.

Artukka wrote:Source of the post Speaking of corruption, McNulty finally called Daniels out (albeit in a veiled way) about the info Agent Fitzhugh gave him about Daniels possibly being dirty. "Why, does [the Deputy] have something on you?" And McNulty did raise a pretty good point about Daniels/Burrell's inconsistent attitudes towards chain of command.

I refused to believe Daniels was (or once was) dirty when McNulty first learned that from the FBI agent, but I can no longer be naive. Daniels and his wife wouldn't be having that conversation if there wasn't some truth to McNulty's claim.

Artukka wrote:Source of the post He said it like he didn't think anybody would have a problem with it, but Orlando's conspiratorial manner should've at least set off some alarm bells, right?

D is proving over and over that he isn't meant for the game. I think he's just stupid enough to know he wouldn't get himself in trouble by mentioning Orlando's side offer to the boys, but he couldn't think fair enough ahead to consider the repercussions for Orlando. D keeps talking about getting out, but will he actually act on it?

Artukka wrote:Source of the post Kima's instincts about who to target are even better than either Lester or Kima could possibly realize, given her current relationship with D'Angelo.

Especially if she finds out that some of Avon's men are responsible for her friend's death via overdose and rape.

Yes, front and follow worked when McNulty put his kids onto Stringer, but how idiotic can he be?! Has a new-ish father that made me judge McNulty a lot. He clearly cares more about this case than the safety of his own kids. Sure, he hasn't seen Avon do anything violent before, but he knows all of the violent orders come from him and Avon.

I found Avon taking the night classes for macro-economics hilarious, but was it suppose to be seen as "woah, this guy is impressive"? It was even funnier when he immediately tried applying what he learned in the print shop. If he wants to run an legitimate business and not just a front, why doesn't he hire legitimate workers? These knuckleheads aren't going to be able to do anything properly.

Not cool of Bunk for cheating on his and for making McNulty call his wife saying Bunk would be home late because of a case.

No mention of Bird this episode? Are we to think he is taking full ownership of the witness murder and keeping Barksdale out of it all?

Shout out to Artukka and Purple_Hayes, it's nice having 2 people around here who have recently watched (Hayes) and someone who is an expert (Artukka). I enjoy reading all the posts made by you guys/gals.

I found Avon taking the night classes for macro-economics hilarious, but was it suppose to be seen as "woah, this guy is impressive"? It was even funnier when he immediately tried applying what he learned in the print shop. If he wants to run an legitimate business and not just a front, why doesn't he hire legitimate workers? These knuckleheads aren't going to be able to do anything properly.

It's Stringer (the #2 of the operation) who is taking the business classes and that McNulty has his kids follow at the market, not Avon... but yeah, this is an interesting observation because I'm not totally sure what the showrunners wanted us to take away from those scenes either. Does it depict Stringer as impressive or comical... or something else (such as a sign of frustration about how the other side of the business is going?) Or all of the above, somehow?

I've found myself in debates with other fans of the series about Stringer and just how savvy/smart he actually is. A lot of viewers are super impressed by him and he's kind of a fan favorite character, but this is one of the scenes I sometimes bring up to point out some of his flaws as a manager and how he seems kind of naive in his application of his book learning (also, I even think that his use of "elasticity" here was a stretch at least in the context of how it's used in his macro course, but I'm not an economist).

No mention of Bird this episode? Are we to think he is taking full ownership of the witness murder and keeping Barksdale out of it all?

The impression I get is that Bird was one of their veteran hitters and he doesn't strike me as the sort that rattles easily, so he probably isn't jumping to make a plea bargain just yet. Even putting loyalty aside, given how the last couple murder cases have gone for the gang, Bird would probably be correct in thinking he has better odds standing tall and beating the murder conviction in court than he does surviving on the streets as a snitch.

Yeah, I've been watching the episodes in time with these postings... though I would've remembered the elasticity line anyway, just not that it happened in this particular episode. I can recall the broad strokes of most of the scenes, major events and funny/notable lines, but it's a little jumbled in my head so I have to watch the episodes or at least read a recap to make sure I don't spoil anything.